


finders keepers

by redefined



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Also Sadness, Canonical Character Death, Dragons, I'll add more tags, LMAO, M/M, Minor Character Death, and magic, as i figure out where this story is going, sorry - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-09-05
Updated: 2015-09-05
Packaged: 2018-04-19 02:36:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,236
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4729538
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/redefined/pseuds/redefined
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>dean is sad & collects dragons, sam is sad & collects knowledge, cas isn't sad & collects emotions</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. preface

**Author's Note:**

> on tumblr @ casturbated

The man stands, wincing as his bones ache. It’s going to rain soon.

He looks down at the parchment in his hands, and regret washes through him. He knows, of course he knows, that it’s for the best, and yet—! She’s been a part of the community forever, through the old seasons of plenty and the barren fields and broken people that have slowly replaced them. And the boy? Strange, distant at first, though he grew warm and trusting under Ellen’s care. He knows that the boy will blame himself, knows that he’ll probably never get over it. Who would?

But still. It must be done. One life, even two lives are not worth all of mankind. He can only hope that he’ll be able to forgive himself when it’s over.

 

: :   : :   : :   : :   : :   : :

 

She shakes her head, feeling shame pour through her. Holy work indeed—sending one of their own off, probably to die. She knows the other two feel the same—though the Council may act aloof, the three of them are connected so deeply with every one of the Magi that sending one of them off on a fool’s errand with the smallest chance of success hurts in the deepest of ways, down in the soul.

They’re a family, the Magi, and she is the matriarch. They’re her children, though her womb has been barren for too many years to count. Being so connected to their minds, their desires and hopes and dreams, their pain and loss and heartbreak, it takes a heavy, heavy toll. The three are supposed to split the burden, to share the weight of an entire civilization, and yet she has always felt it more keenly than either of her brothers.

He must go, though. He must go and do what she cannot, and if he dies she won’t have long to feel guilty about it.

With him go all of the Magi, all of Issla.

He must not fail.

 

: :   : :   : :   : :   : :   : :

 

They are the Moon of the World, the Brightest of Stars, and doubt is not something they feel. They will not feel regret for the loss of a star, for they will not lose him. He is a product of them, raised in their city and trained in their ways. He will not fail.

He will not.

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> sad dean. sorry.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wrote the second half of this chapter while listening to threnody (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LvOoQ0Ff2nA) - makes it approx. 12x more sad

Sometimes he wishes he had a brother. Someone to look after, someone who’d look up to him. He’s happy with a sister, though, even if they don’t share blood. Jo is everything anyone could hope for in a sibling, and he wouldn’t change her for the world.

Benny thinks she’s perfect, but Benny also doesn’t realize that she’ll never be the docile housewife that he wants. For several reasons, actually.

He doesn’t have the heart to tell him that until he starts wearing skirts and growing his hair out—maybe even dying it red, she’s always had a thing for redheads—she’s not going to be interested.

So he has a sister, and most days he forgets that they aren’t really related. (Most of the townsfolk do too—a nasty comment that their “twisted romantic preferences” must run in the family actually might’ve made him smile if he wasn’t too busy punching the asshole in the face). Jo’s enough. More than enough, actually.

“Dean,” the aforementioned sister says from across the sparring mat, “why do you look so sappy? Have you caught a case of the feelings?”

He grins, “I’m just thinking how much I’m going to miss you after I completely _annihilate_ —”

His words and breath are knocked out of him as she tackles him to the floor. Damn, she’s fast. And about to kick his ass if he doesn’t get his head out of it.

By the time he gets her to admit a tie, they’re both drenched in sweat and have lost all feeling in most of their limbs. They haven’t been able to beat one another in years—they’re just too damn close in skill.

Dean groans, “What the _fuck_ , Harvelle, I think you broke my arm.” She just laughs. Laughs! Like it’s funny that he’s not going to be able to move tomorrow. He takes some satisfaction, though, in how ragged that laugh is; he got some damn good hits in.

He somehow is able to stand up, after a good ten minutes of whining and cursing. Jo, proving that she’s actually a nasty little demon trapped in a blonde-haired body, proceeds to shove him back down and run to the bathing room, cackling all the way. What the fuck.

Eventually, Dean wanders outside, intending to wash his face in the river. Instead, before he’s halfway there, Ellen calls to him from the doorway, but before she can finish her sentence his entire life bursts into flames.

He can’t think, can’t breathe. The house is on fire, and not regular fire, either. No, this is witchfire. Witchfire burns bright, fast, and hot, following the path laid down. Once the powder is consumed, the witchfire converges inwards, searching for fuel and finding itself. When witchfire meets witchfire, there’s an explosion to rival a volcano.

He sees it then, the trail of powder through the grass. Fatigue forgotten, he sprints, running to reach that one spot of unlit powder before the witchfire does. He almost makes it.

The fire sweeps inwards, and he’s screaming, screaming for Jo, for Ellen, for his family. It’s not enough. The flames meet, and he’s saved only by Benny diving in front of him, shielding his body with his own. He fights him, hard, because _he has to get in there, he can_ save _them!_ Benny holds fast, despite how badly burned he must be, how much _pain_ he must be in. The minute his grip weakens enough for Dean to slip free, he does, running immediately for the still-burning house.

He spares a thought for Benny as he runs, prays he won’t be too badly damaged by the explosion, and continues running. His _family_ is inside, nevermind that they might be dead. _He can save them._

He tears the door off its hinges, not even wincing as the burning wood sears his hands. _He can save them_.

The red smoke—a side effect of the witchfire—blinds him, but he stumbles through the ashes of the house, his house, searching desperately for Jo and Ellen. He can’t lose them. _Won’t_.

Dean gasps for air, his shirt over his mouth isn’t doing much to keep the smoke out, and keeps searching. Stepping through into what once was the kitchen, he finds them. In the time before the witchfire exploded, Ellen must have ran back here in search of Jo. Her body is curled around Jo’s, and neither of them are moving. Neither of them are breathing.

He takes a step forward—he’ll get them out, he’ll save them—and the archway into the kitchen collapses, burning wood sending plumes of dark red smoke into his face. It _burns_ , like Hell itself burns. He steps closer, desperation giving him strength, but his vision is going dark. The combination of the witchsmoke and the heat and the burns covering his skin are tipping him closer and closer to unconsciousness.

He’s fighting it, hard, but there’s only so much he can do against witchfire.

He drops.

: :   : :   : :

He wakes, and it’s raining.

It’s not like those stories he’s read, where the main character wakes blissfully unaware of what’s happened, only remembering later the tragedy that’s befallen him.

No. It’s not like that.

He knows, instantly. They are dead. Dead and gone and soon to be forgotten. Their neighbors will remember, but Ellen and Jo won’t survive past them. They won’t tell their children about Ellen, about her stern voice and iron will and soft, gentle hands that held Dean when he was hurting and welcomed him when he was alone. They won’t tell them about Jo. Sweet, loving Jo, who covered her heart of gold in iron armor, who fought and loved and _hurt_ with the best of them. Jo, who never had the chance to prove herself the warrior that Dean knew her to be.

_Dean_ will remember, but only if he survives this thing inside him that’s eating away at everything he used to be. This monster, made of red smoke and orange fire and black, soul-eating loss that’s chewing away at his insides. Burning and burning and biting and clawing.

They’re gone.

He couldn’t save them.

It’s so quiet. So, so quiet compared to what he last remembers. They never say how loud fires really are. All he can think of is the noise. The noise and the fire and the smoke and the heat. It’s a part of him now.

He wishes the fire in him were the kind to inspire, the kind to drive him to fight. But all he feels is pain. All it’s doing is filling his head with smoke and pain and loss. He’s in a bed, somewhere. He decides to stay.

He used to be a fighter. He would have killed for Jo, for Ellen.

But what’s the point in fighting if everyone that he fought for is dead?

There isn’t one.

He stays in bed.

: :   : :   : :

The man rubs his knuckles and stares out the window at the rain. His joints always ache on and around the days it rains. It’s his heart that hurts the most today, though. He knows it had to be done. He does. But _God_ , he wishes there was another way. She didn’t deserve that. Neither did he.

The boy’s asleep in his daughter’s bedroom. It almost makes him happy to have it used again, but he cannot bring himself to be happy about anything in this awful situation.

She was the real empath, his daughter. It had skipped a generation from his mother, mostly, and he only really got the vaguest thoughts and inclinations from people. Enough to aid him in his rise to Chieftan, but mostly useless, and easily ignored.

Usually.

Now, though, the pain emanating from his daughter’s bedroom is so strong, so dark and deep and empty that it takes all his willpower not to fall to his knees. If she wasn’t dead and gone so many years past, this might’ve killed his daughter all over again. Instead, he takes the brunt of it.

It is the least he deserves.

: :   : :   : :

He wakes, and wonders why he didn’t think of this sooner. The witchfire.

Witchfire doesn’t happen naturally. The powder had to be set in place, the fire had to be lit, the incantation spoken in the vilest of tongues.

Who, though? Who would’ve done something so terrible, so horrible? The very thought of it makes rage simmer right under his breastbone. Someone caused this. Someone made it happen.

He stands, or tries to. Days of not leaving the bed except to relieve himself have made him weak, his sparse and intermittent eating has made him even weaker.

Slowly, bracing himself on the bed, he makes it into a standing position. Ellen (the name tastes like witchsmoke in his mouth and roaring in his ears) would be disappointed in him. He’s helpless. Leaning on the wall for support, he makes his way out of the bedroom.

“Dean,” Chief Turner says, “I’m so glad to see you up and about.” He rises from a threadbare old chair, and Dean can almost see the arthritis in his joints as he winces. “Can I get you anything? Something to eat, maybe?”

_This_ , from the man who used to smack him upside the head for speaking out of turn. He supposes tragedy makes a friend out of everybody.

“No,” Dean replies, and the cracked and ruined sound of his voice doesn’t surprise him in the least; it matches his insides. And his outsides, too, if the scars winding up his arms are anything to judge by. He wonders how he didn’t notice them before now, thinks back to the alternating roaring pain and silent lethargy and discards the thought.

He looks up from his arms, somewhere to the left of Chief Turner’s eyes, (the fire burning behind Dean’s eyes makes it hard to maintain eye contact) and asks him who did it. Who killed them.

Either his voice is ruined more than he thought it was or the rumor’s about Turner’s family are true (he pities any empath around him right now—he wouldn’t wish this pain on anyone) because he looks devastated. There have been deaths in the village before, and none have affected the Chief like this.

The loss of Ellen and Jo… It’s something he never thought he would have to bear.

They’re dead, though. Dead and gone.

He’ll have a funeral, then. They deserve that, at least. And then, once their ashes and the ashes of their house have blown on the wind, he’ll leave. Leave this village, leave this place.

He _will_ get his vengeance.

: :   : :   : :

One look into the burning eyes of Dean Winchester and Rufus knows they’ve succeeded. What kind of monsters does that make them? Make him?

He’s set on revenge now, and open to being guided.

He feels guilty, so incredibly guilty, but knows that he would do it again. One thing that Rufus Turner never backed down from was responsibility. The sacrifice that Ellen and Jo made, that Dean made, was necessary.

He hopes that one day that will ease his aching conscience.

He knows that it never will.

 

 


End file.
